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Repaired portion of skate park to reopen

The southern portion of Riverhead's skate park at Stotzky Park is reopening.

After being closed for more than a year due to safety concerns, Riverhead Town’s skate park at Stotzky Park is officially reopening this week.

Or at least, half of it is.

Ray Coyne, the town’s recreation supervisor, said the gates will be unlocked at 3:30 p.m. Tuesday.

The town spent more than $60,000 to repair 73 of the boards on the southern, upper tier of the skate park. The potential safety concerns from the poor condition of the boards resulted in the skate park being closed since 2015, Mr. Coyne said.

The remaining 64 damaged boards, on the northern, lower-tier portion of the park, will remain temporarily closed off to the public once the rest of the park reopens, since the town doesn’t have enough money to fix the entire park, according to Mr. Coyne and Councilman Tim Hubbard, who is the Town Board liaison on recreation issues.

It will cost about $70,000 more to complete the whole park, and the town doesn’t have that money, officials said.

Mr. Coyne recently unveiled a plan to put a pickleball court on the portion of the skatepark that has not be repaired.

“It doesn’t cost us any money,” he said last month, indicating that the town already has temporary pickleball courts that can be set up on the skate park.

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